Virginity testing.

Alright, so this post isn’t particularly related to the United States, but I think that it’s completely worth talking about. In Egypt, reports of the re-emergence of forced “virginity testing” have come up.

Back in the days of Hosni Mubarak, women who protested were taken by the army were often administered these tests as a way for the government to be able to claim that they were prostitutes and the government could therefore charge them as such.

Potentially more horrifically, Shahira Amin, a freelance reporter who wrote a piece on these tests, reported that a high-ranking general admitted in a telephone interview that, “We performed the tests to prove that the girls were not virgins so that they would not accuse the army of rape later on.”

There have been tons of reports from female protesters who say that they were pinpointed for attack because they were women voicing an opinion. They would have their clothing torn off, be sexually assaulted and receive threats of rape.

Despite, the complaints being filed against Egypt’s Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, women in Egypt have gotten little more than apologies back and the violence continues.

Should we here in America step in? It’s hard to say. Some feel that the Egyptians need to be allowed to take care of their problems on their own and that America intervenes too much. Others look at these atrocities and say that it is our obligation to help those who are being tortured like this. I think that first step is to make those in charge of the doctors who are administering these “virginity tests” come before a court and face torture charges to let them know that it will not be tolerated. Then, I think it is up to the Egyptian people to continue to make change.